The Contestant

In 1998, Susunu! Denpa Sh­ōnen, a major early reality show in Japan, created an ongoing segment called “A Life in Prizes.” Technically, this part of the show was asking a tongue-in-cheek question: can someone survive off winning sweepstake prizes?

Clair Titley’s fluid and gripping documentary, The Contestant, reveals that the behind-the-scenes questions were somewhat different. Denpa Sh­ōnen producer Toshio Tsuchiya, whose devotion to his stunt- and shock-filled reality show at times seems gleefully fanatical, was really interested in proving his own theory of entertainment. Denpa Sh­ōnen had been dismissed as a travel show with some unusual bells and whistles—when you have guys pedaling to Indonesia in a swan boat, the criticisms went, the over-the-top adventure is the point. Tsuchiya disagreed. The scenario could be anything; the point was a person revealing themselves under stress.

“A Life in Prizes” was his argument for his position. No traditional excitement, just one Job-like young man trying to win magazine and radio sweepstakes totaling over one million yen.

Of course, what the show lacked in adventure, it made up for in cruelty.

Tomoaki Hamatsu—nicknamed Nasubi (Eggplant)—was an aspiring actor and comedian fresh from rural Fukushima. He auditioned for Denpa Sh­ōnen, won a random drawing, and—sans contract—was coaxed into a blindfold, driven to an unknown apartment full of magazines, and ordered to strip naked. He couldn’t wear clothes unless he won them. But hardly anything from this would be broadcast, they assured him. Nasubi believed that it was all akin to a long audition, a challenge that might get him work later on down the line. Why would they air any of this, after all? Wouldn’t it be boring?

After a while, of course, he wasn’t well-equipped to think it all through. He was starving. While the crew sparingly doled out some crackers to keep him alive before he won some actual food, as soon as he won anything edible, even that lifeline went out the window. Over the many, many months that he spent in dehumanizing solitary confinement, much of it broadcast without his knowledge or permission, he lived off everything from fiber jelly to plain rice to (mostly) dog food. Once he won a lobster. That was probably pretty good … aside from having to cook it without any proper kitchen equipment.

The Contestant shows how viewers watched Nasubi starve, his ribs becoming more and more apparent. His celebratory dances at new prizes were attempts to stay sane, and Denpa Sh­ōnen essentially made them into memes. He was famous. His diaries were published while he sat alone in a room, ignored by the crew he’d originally thought would provide some company. Everybody loved him, but nobody helped him. As you watch this documentary, you grow to hate the exuberant laugh-track that sounds over this starving man’s earnest efforts to stay alive and occupy his mind. At one point, Nasubi yawns, and a graphic appears on the screen to point out how long his face is. Hilarious!

Tsuchiya, who was interviewed for this project along with Nasubi himself, shows a kind of offhand cognitive dissonance about it all. He revels in setting up some gut-punch moments, delighting in getting the shot of him telling a victorious, initially relieved Nasubi that there’s going to be a surprise round two. But he might die as penance if Nasubi wanted him to, he says. Well, watching this, I sure kind of want him to.

But—to get back to what questions art and artists are asking—The Contestant isn’t focused on how or why all this happened. It assumes its audience has a basic understanding of the way people often stay in coercive, abusive situations, and it certainly assumes you know that the world of reality TV can be sadistic. Instead, it tells you all of this to get at Nasubi’s own question: what happens next? What does someone do after finally escaping an exploitative situation? What’s it like to be famous for something that was horrible for you but entertaining to almost everyone else? How do you live in a world that’s laughed at you when you were hurting the most?

The answers Nasubi eventually finds to those questions are probably better than mine would be. The Contestant is wise to explore them, because Tsuchiya was only half-right. People are interesting—but not only in extreme circumstances that are deeply wrong to contrive and inflict on someone, Tsuchiya. What you do when you have to is only one part of the equation. What you do with the rest of your life—the very non-blank slate of you, scribbled over and defaced by someone else—matters too. The Contestant introduces us to that version of Nasubi, and it’s easy to be pleased to meet him.

The Contestant is streaming on Hulu.